General Information
Type of contract
Traineeship
Who can apply?
EU nationals eligible for our traineeship programme
Grant
The trainee grant is €1,170 per month plus an accommodation allowance (see further information section), The trainee grant is €2,120 per month plus an accommodation allowance (see further information section)
Working time
Full time
Place of work
Frankfurt am Main, Germany
Closing date
05.01.2021
Your team
You will be part of the Monetary Policy Research Division in the Directorate General Research. This Division is responsible for conducting research in fields such as monetary policy, macroprudential policy and macroeconomics and works closely with monetary policy and economics units.
In your role as Student Research Assistant Trainee, you will support the Division’s work by compiling and analysing cross-sectional, time-series and panel datasets and helping to solve and estimate linear and nonlinear general equilibrium models.
Depending on your area of expertise, you will be assigned to one of three main areas:
The topics covered here include: developing, solving and estimating general equilibrium models on topics that include the effects of non-standard monetary policy; the interaction between monetary and fiscal policy; the nexus between financial stability and macro-prudential policy; the effect of climate change on monetary policy; and the macroeconomic effects of pandemics.
The topics covered here include: structural VARs, unobserved components models, Bayesian estimation, Markov switching models and event study regressions; creating and maintaining databases of quarterly, monthly, daily or high-frequency data from Bloomberg, Reuters, Datastream, SDW, Fred and Thomson-Reuters Tick History.
The topics covered here include: parametric and semi-/nonparametric panel data models such as random/(high-dimensional) fixed effects models, difference in difference, matching models, quantile regression, partial identification, classification techniques and web-scraping; creating and linking new datasets, as well as querying and maintaining databases of quarterly, monthly and daily frequency derived from commercial databases and Eurosystem data; handling and analysing large, high-frequency contract-level financial data and new survey data.
Despite being specialised in one area, you will contribute to common tasks carried out by the Division and interact with researchers from all research areas on a regular basis.
The Division is currently working on a broad range of research projects and providing research-based policy advice. These activities include performing analysis in support of the ongoing
review of the ECB monetary policy strategy, exploring the effectiveness and transmission of non-standard monetary policy measures and maintaining the pilot project to develop the ECB’s
Consumer Expectations Survey.
The ECB is an inclusive employer and we strive to reflect the diversity of the population we serve. We encourage you to apply, irrespective of your gender, gender identity, ethnicity, sexual orientation, age, religion, disability or other characteristics.
Your role
As a Student Research Assistant Trainee in the Monetary Policy Research Division you will:
- solve and/or estimate frontier macro models;
- construct and maintain monetary, financial and economic databases;
- work extensively with unique datasets, macroeconomic and microeconomic data and financial, regulatory and intraday market data;
- present data in conjunction with theoretical economic and statistical analysis;
- develop mathematical, statistical and econometric procedures for research projects;
- contribute to empirical analyses and analytical projects.
As a trainee in the Student Research Assistant Programme, you will have the opportunity to work closely with our economists and management. You will support them in academic research projects and in work of an operational nature, such as the preparation of policy-related notes for the ECB’s Executive Board. This will enable you to develop your analytical skills, enhance your quantitative skills and gain an insight into the ECB’s research activities and policymaking processes. The programme will also expose you to new ideas and stimuli that can provide a useful foundation for your future career and/or postgraduate studies. In particular, you will have access to internal seminars organised by the ECB. You will be part of a multicultural team that strives for continuous innovation to make a positive impact on the lives of European citizens.
Qualifications, experience and skills
Essential:
- for a traineeship: a bachelor’s degree or higher in economics, statistics, finance, computer science, mathematics or a related field;
- for a PhD traineeship: a master’s degree and at least two years of PhD studies in economics, statistics, finance, computer science, mathematics or a related field;
- proficiency in at least one of the following statistical software packages: MATLAB, Stata, Python or R;
- an advanced (C1) command of English and an intermediate (B1) command of at least one other official language of the EU, according to the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages.
Desired:
- for a traineeship: a master’s degree or at least one complete year towards a master’s degree in economics, statistics, finance, computer science, mathematics or a related field;
- experience in at least one of the following areas: solving and estimating DSGE models; solving heterogeneous agent and/or nonlinear macro models; analysing macroeconomic or financial time-series data; compiling and analysing large microeconomic databases - frequency data, administrative data, household or firm-level surveys, balance sheet data and price-setting data);
- a very good knowledge of spreadsheet and database software, such as Microsoft Excel, SQL or Microsoft Access;
- experience with one or more of the following: macroeconomic data, financial market data, firm-level data, accounting/supervisory bank data, other micro data or large datasets;
- familiarity with one or more of the following databases/providers: Bloomberg/Eikon, Thomson Reuters Datastream, Haver Analytics, Bureau van Dijk, Fitch Connect, SNL Financial or Dealogic.
You are curious and eager to learn, and want to further develop your ability to analyse complex information. You are keen to collaborate with others, pursue team goals and learn from other people’s diverse perspectives. You strive to know and anticipate stakeholder needs, and will signal any need for change and propose alternative solutions.
You are motivated to contribute to the ECB’s mission, to serve the citizens of the EU as a member of a public institution and to work with colleagues from all over Europe. You are keen to be part of our team and to use your skills and competencies to achieve the objectives of this position.
Further information
Traineeship/PhD traineeship of between 6 and 12 months in total.
Application and selection process
Further information on how to join us is available on our
website.
The recruitment process for this position will include an online interview via WebEx.
